East Side Story (1981)

New wave UK popster unit Squeeze was always more popular elsewhere than the US, so I was surprised, looking it up, first to see that they did chart twice here and then that those occasions were in 1987 and 1988, with "Hourglass" and "853-5937," respectively. Full disclosure, I don't know those songs. I barely knew they were even still together then—and note, furthermore, they are still together today. But I think the very early part of the 1980s remains their heyday, on the new wave project of a self-conscious return to three-minute pop aesthetics and dynamics (and "fun"). I had the 1980 album Argybargy, their third, and loved it dearly, playing it to death. This follow-up East Side Story is arguably their best. The first single they released from it, "Is That Love," felt like a continuation of the Argybargy groove, a sprightly tune that skips and dazzles and clocks in at 2:31. The second single, "Tempted" (4:00), better represents attempts at growth and development, not to mention a certain star power. It features the band's newest keyboard player then in Paul Carrack, who sings the lead. You may recall Carrack's steady imploring style from the 1975 hit by Ace, "How Long." "Tempted" also features vocal support from Elvis Costello and it's still an exciting moment to hear his memorable, barely competent voice burping up and squeaking out his lines and harmonies. My complaint about East Side Story is not exactly a complaint. I just have never quite been able to put my finger on the whole. It skips around so willfully from style to style, asserting the pop mastery of Chris Difford's and Glenn Tilbrook's collaborative songwriting, that it never quite finds its own groove. These exercises include essays at country in the third single, "Labelled by Love," a limping "Eleanor Rigby" take in "Vanity Fair," all tarted up with a dreary string arrangement, and some tossed-off rockabilly in the fourth and final single, released only in the US, "Messed Around." The song that caught my attention most often listening to East Side Story again recently was the unfortunately named "F-Hole" (in fairness, an F-hole is technically the opening in the body of stringed instruments in the violin family). But "F-Hole," more of a rock band number with a driving hypnotic groove, is another song unlike any other on the album. I see I've used the word "groove" a few times, which is kind of unusual for a project that is so determinedly pop, at least in formal terms: it's all verse-chorus-verse variations with a lot of emphasis on melody and hooks, clocking in at three minutes at least aesthetically. The average song length here is actually closer to four minutes but you take the point. These songs swing wildly in style though most are recognizably Squeeze. I never quite feel like I have a firm grip. Yet playing it, I often find myself noticing how it is full of amazing moments. Maybe they don't quite all add up to an album (14 accomplished tracks notwithstanding) and maybe no song stands very well on its own—they seem to need each other somehow. Curious project, curious reaction. Solid good album?